Joe Biden won 65% of the Hispanic vote in the last presidential election. He campaigned on defending the working class and fixing the U.S. immigration system. Two years into his presidency, he has so far failed to do so, and Hispanic voters are increasingly deserting the Democratic Party. With the start of Hispanic Heritage Month, this Washington Examiner series, Taken For Granted, will look at how Biden and Democratic Party policies are failing to connect with the Latino electorate, how Donald Trump and Republicans have benefited, and how it could swing the November midterm elections.
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) presided over Republicans outnumbering Democrats in voter registration for the first time in Florida history, and the red takeover was fueled by a shift in Hispanic voters.
The number of Hispanic voters registered as Republicans increased by about 15% from August 2020 to August 2022, outpacing the overall increase in GOP voter registration of 5% as well as the growth of total Hispanic voters of 7.8% during that same two-year period, state records show.
The Florida GOP cited DeSantis’s strong policies in support of individual freedom as the reason for its success at the state level as Hispanic voters across the country begin to shift from blue to red.
REPUBLICANS EYE RED FLORIDA FUTURE WITH GROWING HISPANIC VOTER REGISTRATION
DeSantis emerged as a popular governor during the coronavirus pandemic for his refusal to shutter businesses or implement stringent lockdowns. This boosted his approval among his base and independents and has helped sway Hispanic voters further to his side.
“Hispanics really like leadership with a backbone,” Helen Aguirre Ferre, executive director of the Republican Party of Florida, told the Washington Examiner. “They really do recognize that it’s important to have a strong leader, and the governor has a way where he can use the same language and demeanor whether he’s speaking to Wall Street and to Main Street in the same way. That authentic voice makes a big difference.”
Aguirre Ferre, who previously was director of communications for DeSantis and director of media affairs for the Trump White House, said the governor’s message of “what’s good for one group is good for all” has helped him to connect with the Puerto Rican, Cuban, Venezuelan, and other Latino immigrants who call Florida home.
“Hispanics really appreciate his strong leadership, his fearlessness, his not backing down,” she said. “He’s fighting for everyone, but he has a soft spot in particular for the man on the street, for the blue-collar guy, the person who’s working really hard and sacrificing so much to pull their family ahead. And Hispanics, we’re all about family. We’re all about community. We’re all about faith. And when you look at all of that, that only really thrives if you have freedom.”
The total number of Hispanic voters has been increasing since 2019, and while Democrats still have an advantage in total numbers, they lost registered Hispanic voters in the last year.
In August 2020, the GOP had 587,552 registered Hispanics, and the Democrats had 920,324. By last month, Republicans had 676,826, while Democrats had 902,744. During that time, the total number of Hispanic voters increased from 2.37 million to 2.56 million, accounting for 18% of all registered voters in Florida.
Hispanic voters have been indicating for years now that they do not want to be pandered to along racial lines, according to Republican strategist Wes Anderson. He worked on Sen. Rick Scott’s (R-FL) 2018 campaign and, in polling and focus groups, found that the Democratic strategy of assuming certain interests due to race wasn’t working with Hispanics.
“One of the things we found early on was a really sharp rebuke to Democrat racial policy and race theory,” Anderson told the Washington Examiner. “The notion that we should be teaching our kids that your race is super defining in one way or another is a notion that a really sizable majority, pushing three-quarters of all Hispanics, said in Florida … ‘Oh, hell no, that’s a horrible idea.’ And DeSantis policies play right into that [sentiment].”
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He continued that many Hispanics are seeking “full assimilation” into American culture, and outreach that tries to “force them into an identity” doesn’t play well with their aspirations.
DeSantis has gone on the offensive in his reelection campaign against Charlie Crist, his Democratic opponent. Crist’s running mate is Karla Hernandez-Mats, herself Latina and a teachers union official. A Spanish-language radio ad targeted Hernandez-Mats’s opposition to school openings and her 2016 comments after Cuban dictator Fidel Castro’s death.
The Washington Examiner reached out to the Florida Democratic Party and Crist’s campaign for comment but did not receive a response.
Hispanic voters are trending more toward the Republican Party across the country with each election cycle and are becoming a battleground vote between the parties. Issues like border security, school choice, crime, the economy, and social conservatism align with many Hispanic values, according to Republican Party officials, and the result has been victories such as Rep. Mayra Flores (R-TX) in a historically Democratic South Texas district’s special election. Other South Texas districts are trending Republican, and the Nevada Senate race may come down to the Hispanic vote.
